autism aggression – AUTnotISM

Is gamma interferon with your social life?

Yesterday, we went out shopping for a new couch. Fraser loves trying out beds and couches, especially the big puffy recliner ones. After all, they are just house trampolines aren’t they? He bounces from couch to couch testing them all out for us, occasionally reclining with his sister with a wry smile on his face. After the third store though, the novelty began to wear off, not just with him but with Brian as well. I count on this boredom factor, as it usually means I have a better chance of getting the couch I want because it means we’ll get out of the store quicker 🙂 Anyhoo, Fraser did what he does when he’s had enough, he started saying ‘chipst’. Obviously, he wanted chips, but he likes to add a ‘t’ on the end for affect. So we’re wandering around looking at couches and all we hear is ‘chipst, chipst, chipst, chipst’ over and over again. He counts on us getting annoyed, as the annoyance factor usually means he has a better chance of getting the chips he wants…hey, wait a minute! So couchless, but armed with enough visual information to go on with, we headed for home with a quick stop at the drive through along the way. I say to my passengers, ‘does anyone else want chipst’? No reply. I say it again to which Eloise replies ‘i’ll have lemonade’ to which I say, ‘that’s not what I asked’. So, I just decide that one small chipst is our only requirement…easy! All of a sudden, Brian pipes up with ‘I wouldn’t mind a burger. Lets go in’. He NEVER suggests that, so, we go in to the nearest Maccas for some lunch. Fraser and I sit down to wait, while the other two decide they’re going to use some weird machine to order the food. How did it go from one small chipst to this? So, I decide to just go with flow and grab the paper to see whats going on in the world. I decide to bypass the horrific reality that is Donald Trumps speech to the world and open up a random page. I look at the article and realise, we were meant to come to Maccas, this was no accident! The universe had designed this moment just for me. There, in front of me, on page 19 of the Herald Sun, a safe distance away from Trump, was the following article …

IMMUNE VESSELS IN BRAIN LINK TO AUTISM

Now, anyone who has followed an alternative health/gut/immune lifestyle for their Autistic child knows not only innately but through years of hard work and research that Autism is inextricably linked to the immune system. The problem has been that mainstream medicine, mainstream science and especially mainstream media, all like to pounce on such inferences and put us whacko’s back in our places. The big surprise here was two fold: first of all, the information contained in the article was new to me, which is always exciting, and second, the fact that this was appearing in the Herald Sun! This is proof that these ideas that were considered ‘out there’ not so long ago, are thankfully becoming more and more accepted. Maybe now we’ll get somewhere!

So, what did the article say? Basically, new immune cells that have been discovered in the meninges of the brain, have an effect on social behaviour. Interferon Gamma, is an immune cell that is produced in response to a virus or bacteria. As Fraser has a major problem with Strep bacteria changing his behaviour, this was a massive breakthrough for me which helps to complete more of the big Fraser picture. When they interfered with Interferon Gamma (IFN-gamma) in mice, their social responses completely changed. No IFN-gamma, no social interaction, they were wall flowers standing on their own. Switch IFN-gamma back on, and it was mice party time! For something so seemingly simple, this could have a profound outcome for Autistic individuals and other neurologic disorders. So what next? Well of course that meant going back to Google University (like I ever left). So, I typed in ‘how to raise Interferon Gamma’, and to my delight, something really simple came up. So simple, that I had to laugh out loud. The good old probiotic, beloved of parents of Autistic children the world over…Lactobacillus GG, aka Culterelle. I have never been able to find out if this probiotic lowered or raised histamine, so I have and will continue to assume its neutral. Fraser has always better on Culterelle, and this could well be the mechanism, raising IFN-gamma in the brain! He has only one per day, but considering a new packet arrived at my door on Friday, i’m going to up his dose and see what happens. I won’t be expecting a miracle (not that I would knock one back), but, how can I not give it a go?

It is so reassuring to see articles like this coming up, and to know that behind closed lab doors all over the world, people are working to solve these big puzzles. I am grateful to the scientists, the nutritionists and of course, the little party mice for this invaluable leap forward. Keep up the good work dudes!

Lots of love,

Kitty xx

Is Autism Inevitable?

Over the years, I have had many many conversations with many many people about Autism. Some are wanting information, some are just curious, and mostly people are kind and caring. I have noticed though, that one question gets asked more than others. The question is…’are there more kids with Autism these days or is it just diagnosed better’? And my answer is this ‘there are more kids with Autism these days and it is diagnosed better’. I’m not trying to be wiseacre, but to me, that seems to be the answer! With that said, I do have to add one thing. Yes our diagnostic tools are better these days. There are more tests available, and a whole lot more information than there used to be. Of course there are more diagnostic categories than there used to be. It’s not just Autism anymore, it’s Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and within that spectrum lie a vast number of extreme’s and diagnosis. For example : PDD (Pervasive Development Disorder), SPD (Sensory Processing Disorder), Childhood Disintegrative Disorder (CDD), Rett Syndrome, Aspergers Syndrome and of course Autistic Disorder. So indeed, there are a lot more possibilities for diagnosis, BUT, there are waaaaaaay more children being diagnosed than ever before because there are waaaaaaaay more children affected than ever before. All you have to do to know that this is true is to think back to your own school days. Of course there were always one or two kids in the school that were ‘a bit different’, but now it’s hard to meet anyone who doesn’t know or know of, someone that is affected in some way.

Lets look at the possibility of why. 100 years ago, when statistically there was no Autism, what was different? The short answer is almost everything, but lets at least start with something that affects everybody, everyday…food. This is an obvious place to start when you look at the supermarkets of today. Basically, they had meat, vegetables (mostly locally sourced) a little fruit, grains in the form of bread and porridge, eggs, milk, water and perhaps a little sugar in their tea. Of course any treats such as biscuits and cakes were rare and home made. There may have been, for the average person at least, a little alcohol on the odd occasion. Fast forward to today, and while our diet may resemble the basics, it’s a safe bet that we all have a lot more sugar than just a little in our tea, probably more grains than vegetables from all of the pasta, bread, rice and breakfast cereals that we eat each and every day. Add to that, the hormones and antibiotics feed to the animals that we eat, add to that the grains, especially corn, fed to the animals that were never meant to eat grains. Add to that the bombardment of agricultural sprays on our fruits and vegetables, add to that the gmo’s, add to that the depletion of the soils from over farming, add to that the chemicals such as BPA added to bottled water and canned goods that we eat. Add to that preservatives, food colourings, flavour enhancers, gluten gluten and more gluten! Add to that things you can’t even freaking pronounce!!!

Now lets look at the environment we live in. 100 years ago, the population was much smaller than it is today. They were simpler times when people worked close to where they lived. The transport was much more limited than it is today, with bicycles, horses, trains and of course walking being the major ways of getting around. Fast forward to today and there are MILLIONS of cars clogging up roads everyday. If you live in the suburbs or inner urban areas, you can’t escape the sound of traffic, let alone, the bi-products of the traffic namely, cadmium, lead and carbon monoxide. Then add mercury from industrial fumes as well as countless other nasties, now add endless cleaning chemicals and antibacterial hand washes that contain liver damaging triclosan, add to that, heating and air conditioning, flame retardants on our pj’s and almost every piece of furniture we own and of course the biggest add of them all, electromagnetic radiation from power lines, appliances and wireless technology.

Lets have a quick look at the water we drink now. 100 years ago, it was as basic as it gets, fast forward to today and things have dramatically changed with the addition of fluoride and chlorine in the water, not mention the countless heavy metals and industrial waste that have polluted our water supply. There are so many more things that could be added here, but I think i’ve made my point.

So, what does this have to do with Autism? Well, I think when you look at the changes that have occurred in the last 100 years (and this is only scratching the surface), you have to wonder what effect does this have on the human body??? To answer that question, you really only need to look around and see the epidemics surrounding us. It’s on the news almost every day! Obesity, diabetes, cancer, heart disease, dementia and Alzheimers and of course Autism which now affects 1 in 68 children. In 1975 it was 1 in 5000!!! Growing up in the 70’s I don’t think i’d ever heard of anyone having autism or cancer, now, I know too many people who are suffering from these once rare conditions. It is happening really fast. Our bodies have evolved over 100,000 years. How are they supposed to adapt to this tidal wave of assaults in 100 years!!!! I believe that when industrial chemicals, food additives, petrol fumes etc, made their way into the environment, that our grandparents were affected. How could they not be? I believe that these affects were passed down to their children, who have now passed them onto our children and I will use my own family as an example, as this is why this post has any relevance at all. My grandfather died of bowel cancer and Alzheimers disease. My Mum was diagnosed as a child with Crohns Disease and in the last 10 years has developed Rheumatoid Arthritis, her twin sister in that time has been diagnosed with Lupus. Their older sister developed severe Rheumatoid Arthritis in her 30’s. Her daughter, my cousin, was also diagnosed with RA in her 30’s. My grandmother, my mum and her two sisters have all had thyroid problems. I won’t delve further than that for now, but of course, my interest peaks at my own son who has Autism, Intellectual Disability and PANDAS, which is an Autoimmune condition (Rheumatoid Arthritis, Lupus and Crohns are also autoimmune diseases). I believe the affect of these changes have been profound. I believe that our bodies and brains are the results of the cumulative affect of these changes. I believe that some of us, generationally speaking, have paid a fairly high price for these changes. I believe that while our bodies are truly incredible and are obviously capable of dealing with many things, gene’s have been switched on and off in ways that must differ from those 100 short years ago. (Please see my post ‘You MTHFR’). I believe that with all of this in mind, Autism and other conditions must be an inevitability. There are more than 200 chemicals found in umbilical cord blood. 200!!!!!!!! Babies are compromised in utero. Not necessarily through any fault of the poor mother, but from the environment we are living in. Children with Autism are the canaries in the coal mine.

So what is my point? My point as usual is to make people aware. We need to keep our minds open, we need to understand what we are doing and what future we are contributing to. We need to look further than the brain for answers. We need to look more at the gut and the liver, at what price they have paid and will keep paying. We need to not just look for an ‘Autism Gene’, but look for which genes are effected in a person with Autism. We have come such a long way in our understanding, but I think we have a long long way to go. You may not agree with my theory at all and thats okay. But after researching for ten years, it feels pretty obvious to me. As a parent, it is my responsibility to not only look after my beautiful boy, but to help my daughter have the best possible outcomes when she is old enough to have children of her own. This is my conclusion and it feels pretty logical. Now that you’ve read this you may truly understand why I made the title a question and why i’m off to get a glass of Sauv Blanc. Actually, I might make it a green tea instead 🙂

Take care,

Kitty

How I taught my ‘Who’ to type.

In January of this year, my ‘Who’, Fraser, was at a point in his life where frustration at his lack of ability to communicate, was causing him and us, an incredible amount of stress. All he wanted was to look things up on Google and Youtube, but he couldn’t always tell us what it was. He has a limited vocabulary, and sometimes he would say things like ‘Nemo’, if he wanted to look at Finding Nemo. He could say ‘Tigger’ if he wanted to look up ‘The Tigger Movie’, but there were things he wanted to look up that we simply couldn’t work out. You can imagine how upset he became, repeating something over and over, that we couldn’t understand. At times he would just sit and cry. It was utterly heartbreaking, seeing him so distressed. So, I thought, why not try to teach him to type? I had actually tried a few years before, but he had not been ready and/or willing. We had nothing to lose if it didn’t work, but as it turns out, it miraculously did. Here’s what I did…

The first thing I tried at my first attempt a few years ago, was to lock the computer with a password, which was his name. Whenever he wanted to use it, he had to type in F R A S E R. It was simply a matter of holding his pointer finger , and moving it on the keyboard from one letter to the next. Before too long, he was typing it in himself.

Fast forward to 2014…he remembered how to type his name, so I used the thing he was into at the time…’Toy Story 2′. I used the same simple process. I would hold his pointer finger and press each of the letters one by one, while saying the names of the letters, numbers and keys at the same time. T O Y SPACE S T O R Y SPACE 2 ENTER. Within a couple of hours he was doing it himself. We stood there in awe feeling proud and amazed which was an awesome feeling, but the look on his face eclipsed that by a mile. He looked proud of himself. Something that, as far as i’m aware, he’s never felt before. He also looked like he couldn’t quite believe that he made Toy Story 2 images come up on the screen. It was like the world had just opened up for him.

So from there I continued with different movies and things he was interested in. He began spelling them out loud, and when we asked him to spell some of the movie titles, he was verbally able to spell them for us. He developed a voracious appetite for books and the alphabet. He has got some books that he’s had since he was little, that we used to teach him to spell every day items (listed below). I would hold his finger on each letter and say it out loud, then say the whole word, then point to the picture and say the word again. Before long, he could spell every word in every book. He was coming along in leaps and bounds.

I spoke to his teacher at his special school about what we were doing. She asked me if we wanted her to persevere with trying to get him to learn to hand write or if we wanted her to use that time to build on his typing. He is never going to write, so I jumped at the chance, so now he does typing at school instead. He also has a sentence written out about his day, he has a copy of the sentence cut up into individual words, that he has to put back together.

The next thing I did, was to make him a dictionary of words that he likes to look up, the names of all the people in his family, food and drinks that he might like. He has now learned the words, and can spell all of them back to us. We have now progressed on to doing the same with the Magic 100 words. So far he has completed his golden and red words! The dictionary is simply words in categories, such as our names, movie titles, foods etc. I typed them up on the computer, printed them and put them into a display book.

When I look back at the journey that bought us to this point, there are a few things that I just happened to do right along the way! The first thing was to play vocabulary videos, from the time we worked out something was wrong. So from the time he was almost 2, he was watching them and enjoyed them on a daily basis. The other thing was the word books I mentioned previously. We would go through the words and if we could, would show him a real item to match. For example, if the word was ‘shoe’, I would show him a real shoe. If the word was ‘comb’ I would show him a comb. If possible, I tried to buy items that closely matched the pictures. I did the same thing with the vocabulary videos. I also had alphabet books that I used. I had a variety from the local bookstore.

I am happy to report that he is still continuing to progress. He has an iPad, so he sometimes looks things up that he wants (he somehow manages to find things on youtube, by just touching links that he sees). He will pause on the title screen, then bring the iPad to the computer and copy the writing from the screen into the search engine onto the computer!! These gadgets are opening up a whole new world.

My sister and I have created an app called ‘Emotion Fonts’, that allows children (and adults) to select a font that represents and emotion, such as anger (bold black font), happy (apple green type) and sad (light blue soft looping font), to allow communication and intent to be clearer for everyone. The app can be used as a little whiteboard, or you send your message via email, Facebook and Twitter which we hope will help teenagers especially.

If you are reading this, you maybe looking for ways to help your child communicate better. I truly hope this information helps. The best advice I can give is to just give it a shot! Apart from some possible disappointment, there is not much to lose at all, and look at the gains you and your child might make.

Below are a list of items that I have found that have been particularly helpful. Apart from the Emotion Fonts app, I am not affiliated with any of these products. They are simply the ones that not only have worked for us, but that Fraser has actually loved and I highly recommend them.

Baby Bumblebee Vocabulary Builder DVD’s. Search http://www.babybumblebee.com

Baby’s First Library. We have ABC, Words, Numbers, Animals, Food, Vroom and School. They are available at Amazon, and are great because each page has one large picture with the word written underneath. We have had these books for years and have certainly stood the test of time. I have put his name stickers over the ‘Baby’s First Library’ title, as I don’t want him to feel anything other than pride, but these books as therapy and a teaching tool are fantastic.
Find them here : http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=babys+first+library&rh=n%3A283155%2Ck%3Ababys+first+library

The app, ‘Emotion Fonts’ is available on iTunes for $1.29. We would have loved to be able to make the app available for free, but building an app is quite an expensive exercise, and we have not allowed any advertising on the app, so as to keep it simple.
Find it here : https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/emotionfonts/id779305002?mt=8

Just to finish, I want you to know that Fraser is 11 years old. We never thought he would be able to do this, and he has. His paediatrician was blown away by the fact that he can do this. When I told him about at our last appointment he said “you know, if you had have asked me if I thought Fraser would be able to type, I would have said the chances aren’t good, but we should obviously never underestimate these kids’. It’s so true. You just never know what is going on in those minds of theirs (what we wouldn’t give to know)! It doesn’t matter how young or old your child is. It doesn’t matter if they have Autism and Intellectual Disability like Fraser, or just one or just the other. It’s worth a try. Our hope for the future, is that this new skill will build and he will be able to tell us the things he is feeling. For years I have asked one question, over and over, and I hope one day, if he can’t tell me what it is, he can type it. Hopefully soon when I again ask him ‘what’s your favourite colour’?, he’ll type me the answer. When I find out, i’ll let you know 🙂 I truly wish you all the best. Don’t hesitate to leave a comment and let me know any success stories. I’d love to hear them.

Kitty
xx

Lithium…more than just a really cool Nirvana song.

Okay, it’s also a cool song by Evanescence, but I just couldn’t fit that in the title. Anyhoo, i’ll get to that later.

My all time favourite movie is Apollo 13, not only because of the great acting, direction, music, attention to detail and because Tom Hanks is in it, but because, at its heart, the true story of Apollo 13 is a testament to what incredible things human beings can achieve not only when they want to, but when they have to. The differences between wanting to and having to can be vast indeed, but when the desire is there, great things can happen. The movie is obviously about the Apollo 13 mission to the moon in 1970 that ultimately ended up almost costing the astronauts their lives. Jim Lovell, the mission Captain, had been in an unexpected situation before and referred to it in the movie…

'I remember this one time. I'm in a Banshee at
 night in combat conditions, so there's no running lights on the carrier. 
It was the Shangri-La and we were in the Sea of Japan, and
my radar had jammed, and my homing signal was gone
because somebody in Japan was actually using the same
frequency and so it was leading me away from where I
was supposed to be. And I'm looking down at that big black
ocean. So I flip on my map light. And then suddenly zap
everything shorts out right there in my cockpit, all my
instruments are gone, my lights are gone, I can't even tell
now what my altitude is. I know I'm running out of fuel, so
I'm thinking about ditching in the ocean and I
look down there and then in the darkness there's
this green trail, it's like a long carpet
that just laid out right beneath me, and it was the algae,
right. It was that phosphorescent stuff that gets turned up
in the wake of a big ship and it was just leading me home. 
And... if my cockpit lights hadn't
shorted out, there's no way I had ever been able to see
that. So you never know what events
are gonna transpire to get you home'.

Yesterday, I took my kids shopping to the local shopping centre (‘whoa Kitty, livin’ large’! I hear you thinking), which, with a child with autism, can be fraught with peril and could be very aptly described as ‘combat conditions’ as the list of possibilities can be endless, from running away, to screaming (his sisters favourite…NOT), demanding ‘chocrat’ or ‘chipst’ at the top of his voice and heaven forbid anyone knock him, ’cause he not only has autism, but is afflicted with ‘indignation’ and he will give, bigger and better than he got if he’s in the right (or wrong) mood. In his defence, shopping centres are those mystical places that to some of us humans, are calling to us like the Sirens of myth and legend, while to others, they are like torture chambers that do nothing but inflict pain and discomfort. My husband is in that last category and he doesn’t have autism. So poor Fraser has been hit twice, not only does he have the big ‘A’, but he is also, just a chip off the old block!

Anyhoo, before I tell you what happened I will go back a few weeks, as I want to keep you in suspense. As I have previously mentioned, in the last few weeks of school of 2013, I started to treat Fraser for his high histamine by giving him large doses of vitamin C, calcium and a half a Zyrtec everyday and the results were nothing short of miraculous. That was then. What has been happening is that he has had a major exacerbation of symptoms, which is common as you are pulling histamine (or any type of toxin) out of tissues to be removed from the body. He has been very difficult to handle at times. He has ranged from just looking and feeling unwell to being so agro that he’d have Mike Tyson cowering in the corner. This is soooo difficult to watch because he just looks so tormented. So, when you see your child turn from calm, happy and settled with no negative behaviours, to one that is raging, agro and out of control, what do you do? PANIC!!! I couldn’t call for help on the radio, and the lights had shorted out, Like Jim Lovell, I was flying blind! I know you’re not supposed to panic, you’re a mummy, that’s not what you’re supposed to do…at all, but I just couldn’t help it. A year ago he was ‘asked to leave’ his special school and here we were, a year later, possibly back where we started dealing with the same unmanageable behaviour. Now, I knew as I dealt with the Histamine, that this could happen, but sometimes, as a Mummy, the logical part of me is not in control. The funny thing is, if I saw someone else’s child going through the same thing I know I would say ‘don’t worry, this will get better’ but I couldn’t do it for myself in the panic mode I was in, and as much as I love my hubby, he’s hopeless at that. His big advice when he saw me stressing was ‘stop stressing’. Yeah right! So, my panicked but curious Capricorn self kicked in and began what i’ll call a ‘fractal quest’, one that has branched of the side of the main quest. So, I stayed up researching late into the night, and something crept into my head that had made it’s way there before during another difficult time. It was the thought that ‘maybe there’s something else wrong here’. As difficult as it was, I started to look at childhood schizophrenia and bipolar, and while he has some overlapping symptoms (which is very common), I wasn’t convinced either way. As I said, I was in panic mode, and I had to find a way to help him settle. He had been on a very low dose of Risperdal (an antipsychotic) for the past year, and there was no way, we were going to raise the dosage. I hated giving it to him at the best of times, but when he was agro, it seemed not only pointless as it clearly wasn’t working, but dangerous to continue. I searched and searched, like Captain Lovell looking for something, anything to guide him, and then, I found my green carpet laid out for me! While it wasn’t as clear as that at the time, the sound of it glittered like hope in my head. Enter ‘Lithium Orotate’ (now the title should start to make some sense). I started researching the overlapping symptoms of Autism and Bipolar and the supplements for children and adults with these overlapping symptoms when I read about the Lithium Orotate. Just to be clear, Lithium Orotate is a naturally occurring mineral and nothing to do with Lithium Carbonate that is prescribed by psychiatrists for Bi-Polar. I started reading reviews and blogs by other parents and sufferers and it sounded fantastic, in fact, it sounded waaaay to good to be true but, as I said, I was in panic mode, and with a tingle of hope, I searched and found some locally available, and had it express posted the next day, and made the decision not to give him the Risperdal anymore. I had wanted to get him off the medication since the first dose! But he needed it at the time.

I don’t know much about Lithium Orotate and I don’t for a second want to pretend that I do, I just want share the journey of what i’m doing, and I invite everyone to do their own research before putting anything into yours or your child’s body, however, I felt that I knew enough at that point to give it to him safely. What I do know it’s that Lithium Orotate works particularly well on Autistic children who have high levels of toxic metals (as Fraser most definitely does) so, I nervously gave him the first dose. I really was nervous, because I’ve had bipolar friends on Lithium and I know how much trouble it can cause. I had to get my head around the fact that this was different. I cut it in half, put into the good old peanut butter and watched nervously. Now, 30 days is what I read is the time it takes to build up in the system and have a noticeable effect, so I was only watching to make sure nothing negative happened to him. Within an hour, he seemed a little sleepy, but so calm!!! He just seemed happy, like some of that inner tension had just evaporated! I was perplexed, and still am that this happened so quickly! It has been five days and he is a new boy… again!

So, shopping centre story. I said to little man, ‘we have to go to the shops and get some things, then we’ll get you some chips’ (have to sweeten the deal somehow), so off we went. For the first time, he got into the car without a twirly ( tape measures he like to twirl around his fingers, he doesn’t go anywhere without one and hasn’t for years), no iPad, ipod or even a book. He calmly got in and put on his seatbelt. We went to the supermarket and got some food, and he was fine. We went to Ishka because it’s his sisters favourite store, and he was fine. We went to the food court and as I lined up to get his beloved ‘chipst’, proudly watched as my children calmly sat at the table and played together. He finished his chips and happily sat and waited for us to finish our lunch (he’d normally run off as soon as he was done and yell ‘cart’ to go back to the car), while smiling and looking around at everyone and everything. We then went to Kmart, where he excitedly bounded around looking at books and DVD’s. He got himself a Lion King book and happily carried the bag of shopping back to the car. So lets re-cap…busy supermarket, check! Small overstocked, pungent smelling, brightly coloured specialty store, check! Noisy, pushy, overcrowded food court, check! And hugely overwhelming department store, check! It may not sound like a big deal to you if your child doesn’t have Autism or sensory issues, but for us it was incredible. I got to feel like a normal Mummy! It was so joyous watching the kids walking hand in hand through the centre. As much as I enjoyed watching them enjoy each others company, I wanted to shout out to everyone in the food court ‘check this out’!!! Once we got home, didn’t pick up a twirly until 3 in the afternoon.

At this point I don’t know if it’s just the Lithium, the lack of Risperdal, or the lowering of the histamine, but he’s happy again, and that’s all that matters for now. If he wakes up agro again tomorrow, I know that peace is possible, and the right balance will make it happen again, as there is more than one green carpet. As I have been researching, I have found something incredibly interesting. Risperdal (the potent brain shrinking anti psychotic drug he was on) is a potent anti histamine!!!!! I have to wonder, if it’s course of action in the year he was taking it, has been not by affecting his dopamine levels as it was prescribed for, but lowering his histamine. It seems that with all of the other histamine lowering supplements, that the risperdal’s method of action in Fraser’s body was not only no longer needed, but causing the very aggression is was supposed to curb!!!! The great thing is, that none of it was in vain, as without this course of events, we wouldn’t be riding the green carpet today. I’m not a big fan of medication, but as i’ve said previously, it is often necessary. What is the point of doing all of the other things to help, if you can’t get the stress levels down! There’s not a lot of point to dragging out excess histamine and toxins if the adrenals are going to be shrivelled up little prunes by the time your done! Cortisol and stress MUST be kept low as much as possible and there are many herbs, supplements and medications that reduce stress. Finding what works is such a hard slog, but ultimately worthwhile. It seems for now, that things are continuing to look up again.

There is one thing final thought that I want to leave you with. In the midst of all of this, I wrote an email to Fraser’s pediatrician outlining his behaviour, but I never sent it. I saved it to drafts and didn’t think about it again. Two days ago, Fraser took his Dad to the computer, opened up the emails, and went straight into the drafts to the email about him. He wanted his Dad to delete it. We don’t know how on earth he knew it was there. He certainly wasn’t around me when I wrote it, but he somehow knew it was there, and wanted it gone. This child continues to amaze me in every way. It seems that he has been craving foods for many years, that contain the most natural lithium…bread (grains) and potatoes (nightshades), and since starting on the Lithium, his need for large amounts of these foods has markedly decreased. At this point all I can say is…’watch this space’. I’ll keep you posted,

Kitty xx